Traveling Tarnished

Your reaction to this picture depends on how long you have been traveling.  Does it make you think of adventure, or lack of comfort?
After a time the newness of a place begins to fade. You stop snapping pictures because they seem all the same.  The heat stops being a welcome relief from the cold, it is now just hot and saps your energy.  The stickiness mixes with the dust and always feels like you need another shower. You start praying for rain and AC.
Where the mantis and butterflies inspire wonder the first week in a new place, the cockroach in the shower is horrifying a couple of weeks later.  The novelty of washing clothes by hand has

worn off when you realize you have to stand in the ants while wringing them out. And if and when you start to feel ill, you wish for your bed and favorite foods.
What at first you found unique and life changing becomes irritating and not worth the bother. Then "different" turns from interesting to not-good-enough, and we start to wish for home.  We know we  will take off again, and another trip is already in the planning stages, but we crave the new and shiny.  Our travel experience has become tarnished.  We rarely stay in a place long enough to see an image tarnished.  But if we do, then we know its time to move on.

I wonder what it's like to stay long enough to rub the tarnish off the sights and experiences and see the real lives underneath. You would have to be there long enough for that dog to stop barking at you and let you pet it on your way past; for the bored teen to notice your presence and respond to your greeting; to turn over the present of a rag rug and notice all the work that went into making it; for the crying baby to stop fussing and smile when you offer to take her; for a local to allow you to pay for their meal; to feel brave enough to drop by someone's place uninvited; to be able to sit out by the doorway and know the names of those who stop by to chat.  Then you know that the "different" has become familiar.
Unfortunately, by the time you've rubbed your tarnished travel bright again, you are leaving to go home.